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Urging agreement on a casino-authorization bill among legislative negotiators who have showed little progress in closing significant gaps, Gov. Deval Patrick on Tuesday reminded lawmakers of his opposition to racetrack slot machines, said he could support efforts to underpin the horse racing industry and outlined ideas for helping displaced track workers.

The governor said he wanted fewer messages passed through “carrier pigeons,” and more communication with Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert DeLeo.

Patrick told reporters, “I think there’s a compromise in here that I could support that offers some kind of support for traditional racing. I don’t exactly know what that is, but my position on slots at the tracks isn’t changing.”

Both Suffolk Downs and Plainridge Racecourse have signaled interest in bidding for full-blown casinos. Under the House plan, those tracks and the state’s former dog tracks, Wonderland and Raynham-Taunton, would be guaranteed up to 750 slot machines apiece. Suffolk and Wonderland, in neighboring Revere and East Boston, share a joint venture.

Patrick and Murray have signaled stiff opposition to the House-backed guarantee of slot machines for racetracks. Voters in 2008 chose to ban dog racing.

Asked Tuesday about a sop for Raynham-Taunton, Patrick replied, “There’s been some talk about, again if there are destination resort casinos, that the employment … first dibs would go to people who used to work at the tracks, and, you know, I get that, I understand that, and that may help.”

After Speaker Robert DeLeo last week stepped up his insistence on slot machines at the tracks, which he called vital to job preservation and $100 million annually in immediate local aid, Patrick called on lawmakers to “dial down the rhetoric,” a device he used again Tuesday. Patrick said he was unsure whether a final agreement could be reached, saying there were “a lot of messages being sent through what someone described as carrier pigeons … I think there has to be conversation directly with the principals.”

“We’re not going to get a bill without a compromise between the House and the Senate, and there isn’t going to be a compromise until both sides start to engage with each other and dial down some of the rhetoric,” Patrick said Tuesday, during a visit to the News Service office that spilled into the hallway, an unusual gubernatorial visit to the fourth-floor press row.

“Everybody’s clear about their position, but getting a bill is going to require some compromise,” he said.

DeLeo said Monday, “Any bill that comes out, as far as I’m concerned, out of conference committee should have a slots component.”

Asked during an appearance on NECN whether the House conferees would sign off on a bill without racinos, the Winthrop Democrat replied, “I’ll never say never, because I think that’s part of the conference committee and what they should be doing, but I would say it’s a very important aspect of the bill I want to see there.”

The governor said the clogged legislative pipeline, backed up behind gambling, argued for “talking to each other, instead of about each other.”

“I am concerned that so much important work has been left to the end of the session. We’ve got a lot of stuff backed up,” Patrick said, referring to criminal justice policy changes, economic development proposals, and efforts to ease health care costs for small businesses.

With the July 31 close of formal sessions approaching, the prospect of a finalized expanded gambling law, once deemed a near certainty, has clouded. While Patrick, Murray and DeLeo – the so-called Big 3 of state government – all want casinos, the notion of slot machines, mechanics for regulating the industry’s start-up, and treatment of tribal nations seeking gambling rights remain tripping points.

“There are a lot of different conversations, there are a lot of moving parts, so I don’t want to harden over any particular part,” Patrick said Tuesday.